Last year when I went on maternity leave, I left my work on a high, with the boss giving a fab pep talk about how well I was doing and how much they wanted me back. Being politically correct as one has to be here, what he didn’t say was how much they wanted me back, in six months or sooner, rather than later. I decided to take a year out — the full legal allowance for mothers in the UK — and came back in a part-time role.
The Second Round
Eight months in, and I’m getting ready to welcome our second child into the world. In all likelihood, 2017 will be spent in a haze of feeds, burps and nappies, along with a jealous toddler. So albeit making all the right congratulatory noises, I can understand why my employers aren’t exactly thrilled about it.
I spent quite a few days worrying about my job post maternity, juggling it with two kids etc, till my little monkey slapped my face and brought me back to reality. Well, I’m sure he meant to pat my cheek gently, but at 17 months he doesn’t do gentle, so the smack in the eye was followed by crashing his face into mine — his version of a kiss — and I realised the obvious: I was risking missing the present, what was right there in front of me, while worrying about the future a year down the line, in a situation that really could not be helped.
What do I Want?
I want a job flexible enough to let me prioritise my children till they are at least 5 years old, rewarding enough, because having children makes you realise how short life is, how quickly time flies, makes you want to cut through the BS and do what really, really matters to you and perhaps the people around, and finally, well-paid enough so that there’s some money left over from the exorbitant child-care to afford some perks in life.
Or I could go live in a country that enables mothers to take 2 years off, financially incentivises men to share parental leave, offers low-cost but very high quality state-sponsored child care — I’m thinking Sweden or Iceland but Darling Husband thinks the 6-month long winter will depress the daylights out of us.
The Real Dilemma
Anyhow, in the past one year, I’ve been immersed in mummy-world, in real life and in virtual groups, and I found: The above job description is too much to ask — unless you’re super lucky to have a job that can be picked up where you left it off, it’s simply too much to ask.
Your years at a company won’t count, your seniority will not make much of a difference and having a female boss with or without children will mean nothing. Having family around to provide free child care helps, but how many of us have that anymore?
Our parents have active social and working lives, and reside in different cities from us if not different continents. It’s easier if you’re the boss or a c-level executive — at least that’s what I found. And if you’re the boss, in all likelihood, you are what people call a “mature” or “older” mother, meaning late 30s or early 40s — so is there such a thing as a win?
I’m very clear about my priorities — and becoming increasingly aware that real life is far from letting me have my cake and eat it. I don’t have the answers; I don’t think anyone does.
In short, you can’t “win” in the traditional “have-it-all” sense. You have to define what “win” means to you. I’ve been trying to do that since I found out about the second pregnancy. Taking stock of what’s here and present, what defines “success” for not just me, but for my family unit and what is the best role I can play in that.
(The author is a former TV journo who stays in London. She became Mama to baby Leo in April 2015. She started this blog as an outlet for the intense, roller-coaster experience that pregnancy and motherhood entail. And for recording the journey with as much humour –—black mostly — as she can cram in. Oh and dispensing free gyan as she ticks the been there, done that milestones.)
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